Without You Within You
by Plastic Raven
Summary: Tails' latest invention is ambitious: it claims to be able to stick a fox's (or Seedrian's) mind inside a robot's body. But Cosmo, the girl he loves, believes in him, so together they undergo the radical new procedure that ends up bringing them closer together than they could imagine.
1. Chapter 1

The machine was extremely complicated. Tails could recite the function of every piece and its arrangement upon command, and because his goal was so risky, so antithetical to nature, that was exactly what he did. When he had run out of parts to double-check, he would just go back from the beginning.

"Tails, will you be ready to start soon?"

"Yaaaaaaaah!" He dropped his self-written instruction manual and the pencils he was holding all over the ground, but the girl who had volunteered as his assistant knelt right down to pick them up and gently lay them back down in his trembling, open palm.

"Cosmo!" he breathed. "Uh… yeah, sure!" He wiped a quivering dollop of sweat from his forehead and ushered her onto a circular, short platform on the ground, demarcated as hers with its light green trim. It was one of four platforms, and another was yellow-orange for him, and yet he did not budge after placing the girl he loved on her perch.

She knew he could do better, so she took both of his hands and walked him over, then back to her station. "It's okay," she whispered to him just before letting him go, "you worked so hard on this; you got right every one of my quiz questions about it. Why let that go to waste, Tails?"

He sighed and turned away from her. "Because it's never been done before."

"Well, that's why they say that there's a first time for everything, isn't it? And of course it hasn't – it's difficult enough, but _cool_ enough, that only someone like you could do it."

Although she could not see his face, his shoulder blades tensed up and he turned back to her. He was confident. "Haha, I guess so! You're right; we've got this! And this _will_ be pretty sweet!"

"Besides," she laughed, "I feel bad about always using you as _my_ volunteer for all of my woodworking projects."

"They really _should_ include instructions on the box for removing nails from fur and flesh, shouldn't they? But I guess I have shelves for all of the books like I used for this project, so I'm glad to have helped!"

"Is it time to get transfigured?" she asked, clenching her fists by her sides with excitement.

"It sure is!" He flicked a switch nearby his arm, setting the machine into motion.

The pads occupied by neither Seedrian nor fox almost were: he had created robotic facsimiles of her and of himself, and all four pads were connected to the central mechanism and to one another by several cords each. The machine started revving up with energy, and they could feel the electricity generated between them pulsating through their pads – there was no turning back now. Soon they would experience something never accomplished before: their minds would be transferred, temporarily, to robots' bodies.

It was an exciting proposition. It was a little bit scary. But as the room filled with the light that accompanies lots of esteemed scientific discoveries and both of the living creatures' bodies, as well as those of their mockups, were engulfed in energy, it was soon to be realized.

 _Zzzzzzapppp!_

* * *

Suddenly, the lights were out. Tails' heart thudded almost audibly; he wasn't quite sure if he was dead. The machine continued to crackle, though, which served as some reassurance, and he could feel the ephemeral wave of heat permeating through the room.

"Alright, uh, I'm gonna go turn the lights on, Cosmo, so we can see how we look!" He marveled at how realistic his own voice was sounding coming through artificial vocal cords, but that was what one could accomplish with the phonological and anatomical rigor he had sunken into this project.

 _Click!_ As if by magic, the lights clicked on by themselves… and he felt immediate dismay.

The Tails robot was still right there on its perch, and so was Cosmo's. He looked down at his hands for confirmation, and there it was: he was still the same old fox as ever.

"Hey, I'm a fox!" he yipped without meaning to. _Well, of course I am_ , he thought. _Did I even mean to say that out loud? Rrrrgh._

He could only imagine that his girlfriend had met the same fate – or non-fate was more like it – and so he turned to see. And then his heart dropped in his chest as though its twin tails had been severed.

Her body was lifeless. He stuck his hand to it and, turning her over as she was face-down, listened to her chest. There was no sound whatsoever. She was dead.

"COSMO!" he shrieked, tears welling up across enough of his eyes that it became difficult to see and his voice shattering with the sobbing. "NO! YOU _CAN'T_ DIE! I'VE BARELY EVEN GOTTEN TO HAVE YOU BACK! I'LL INVENT ANOTHER MACHINE TO REVIVE YOU! I HAVE DESIGNS FOR THOSE! RUDIMENTARY, OF COURSE, BUT THEY'RE STILL-  Tails, I'm right here! I'm fine!"

Those words he definitely had not meant to speak. He clutched his head and panicked in a much more immediate, terrible way than before: not only was the love of his life gone for real by his own hand, but he had gone insane from the trauma and could no longer control his vocal cords, even to confess.

He decided to try the classic pinching test. Yes, that was right. This had to be a nightmare. But this time, if it were not, he would resist the urges to squeal in pain, because it would be pain he would deserve, and then much more. He lowered hand to arm and pinched as hard as he could. "Ow! Stop it, please!"

Still a murderer and still crazy – Murphy's law. "Tails, don't you get it!" he yelled again. "I'm Cosmo! I'm right here! We're in the same body!"


	2. Chapter 2

And his world calmed back down.

"Oh!" he chirped. "That makes sense!" He lurched over to inspect the four pads of the machine and was both dismayed and relieved to have his instinctive hypothesis confirmed: he had connected the cords wrong, and the mind of Cosmo's robot would presumably have likewise been merged into that of his, except that neither was activated anyway. Although his attentive skills had failed, at least his machine-building skills were as strong as ever.

The room, while lit and stable again, however, still felt rather chilly, and he shivered. "Hey, Cosmo, does it feel cold in here to you?"

"No, not at all!" he yipped again. "Your fur is so nice and snuggly! ...Uh, I guess I'm glad to hear that; thanks for the compliment!"

"Erm..." He was feeling quite normal, thankfully, but he was becoming curious as to how being Tails really did feel. "How do you feel? ...Or, how do _I_ feel- you know what I mean."

"I'm not sure." He rubbed the fur on his own arms, almost vigorously enough to generate sparks. "It's so cool to feel all this fuzzy stuff and... for it to be _me_! Well, yeah! Welcome to life as Tails!"

"'Tails'..."

"What? O-oh, I'm sorry. As Cosmo's mind in Tails' body-"

"No, no, your name just gave me an idea. Can I try... flying?"

"I don't see why not, but you've never even had _one_ tail before."

"Is that a challenge?" he retorted playfully. Sure enough, one and then both of them began to flick receptively back and forth. "Ooooooooh, this is fun!" But, for the time, this was as far as he could get. "But how _do_ you actually _fly_ with these? I've never understood it. "

"Lots of people don't! That's okay. It's kind of hard to explain, so if you wouldn't mind, I'll just-" He trailed off and started whirring them himself, but he put on the proverbial brakes and they stopped. "No, I want to try it myself! I mean... if you'll teach me."

"Of course I will! I'm just surprised it's that important to you. Well, how often does one get to _switch bodies_? Good point! Uh, anyway, start flicking 'em again!" And he did, just as patiently and yet haphazardly with regards to actual vertical locomotion as before. "Now spin them each in a circle, one over the other! I usually go left over right by instinct, but that's probably why you always beat me in arm wrestling."

"Like this?" He tried it. "Not quite – same direction!" He tried again and, sensing with encouragement that he was starting to get it, started speeding them up. "Good! Now just keep them about equally spaced, so it's not uneven when you fl-ah-ah-ah-heyyyyy, you're doing it!"

He rose into the air, starting off a few inches at a time and then excitedly whipping about the entire room. "Uh... be careful, Cosmo! Oh, I will, but this is so much fun! I know, but isn't safety more fun?"

But he ignored... himself. He flew right-side up, upside down, and before he could exhaust too many other directions, straight into the wall. "Oof! Oof!" he exhaled, sliding down it and tumbling ungracefully onto the floor.

"Ha-ha-ha-ha!" Dizzily, he rattled his head around and attempted to keep his line of vision in one direction. "Uh... you're a plant; doesn't being able to sink your roots into the nice, comfy ground feel better? ...Yeah, I think it does..."

"Oh, hey!" He had another idea, alluring enough that tumbling vision and nausea were no match for it. "Why don't we go and show everyone else what we've become?"

"Cosmo, I don't know if that's such a good idea, but- oh, um, okay" – his legs were kicking into motion anyway – "I guess that's what we're doing!" He exerted a weak effort to try to slow his own legs against the inner Seedrian's excited motions, but he reached the door at the edge of his office and swung it ajar before the fox was quite ready.

" _Ooowwwwwwch!_ " The doorknob, which had still been in the way, had careened right into his groin. He paced around aimlessly in an attempt to shake off the pain, but it lingered longer than one occupant had expected. "So _that's_ what that feels like! I'm so sorry. Why don't you boys ever wear clothing to protect yourselves?"

"You know, I've never thought about it, but it's been so long now, it'd be weird to start."

"Anyway..." He took a deep breath to let his original occupant speak his mind. "Tails, why do you want to keep this transformation of ours a secret?"

 _Whip!_ The door opened right up again anyway, and standing in the doorway was their friend Amy Rose. "Tails, are you okay?" she asked, concerned. "I heard a bunch of pained screaming and loud noises, and those anti-science shows aren't even on right now."

"I'm fine, Amy-" – he looked curiously at the expression of horror rapidly spreading across the pink hedgehog's normally cheerful face – "but what are you looking at me like that for?"

" _C-C-C-C-COSMO!_ " she spat, sprinting over to the technically unharmed but still very much motionless Seedrian body sprawled out on its pad.

"...That's why I wanted to."


	3. Chapter 3

"Amy, calm down!" he pled to his trembling, horrified friend. "I'm fine! I'm just- oh..."

"I-I-I KNOW _YOU'RE_ UNHARMED, YOU MONSTER! BUT COSMO – SHE WAS SO INNOCENT AND SWEET AND NOW SHE'S- SHE'S-" Amy sank onto the floor before the poor fox, clutching her head in her hands and keeping her eyes trained on an empty spot arbitrarily picked with the tension involved in lifting a thousand-pound weight. "It's okay." She was hyperventilating and heaving back and forth. "I'll just guide the others in, and they won't have to listen to my sorry attempts at explaining this. They'll do something with him, and we'll all be fine with him-"

"AMY, PLEASE, CUT IT OUT!" Still, she refused to look at the devastated young boy. "I'M COSMO! I'M IN TAILS' BODY, TOO! I'M DIFFERENT NOW, BUT I'M _STILL ALIVE_! "

It was unclear for a few seconds if she had understood the words that had in other respects been unimaginably too loud, pained, and honest to have evaded her notice otherwise. Then she stared up at the fox in a kind of absolute loss of comprehension with which one looks at a tornado swallowing oneself up, or letting them back down.

Still, it was something. "She's right!" Tails cried, helming his own vocal cords once more. "I- I mean, I'm right! Here, look!" He ran over to point out the botched connection of cords on the machine. "Remember me telling you over breakfast that one time about the machine I was building that could switch people's minds into robots' bodies? Well..." He threw his hands up. "I messed up, and now I'm Cosmo's robot!"

Her eyes were more naturally following his motions toward the machine now, and she gulped, nodded, and started to resume a more normal breathing pattern. "I guess that makes sense," she squeaked. "But I still need more proof before I accept one of my best friends becoming... _immobile_. How about..."

Tails attempted to look at... himself confusedly, wondering what she had in mind.

"...you, _Cosmo_..." She appeared to be almost genuinely _smiling_ now. "...tell me something Tails would never say?"

"Uh... Boy, I sure do hate having two tails!" he chirped in a voice about as squeaky relative to his normal voice as his normal voice was to Cosmo's.

"Eh... you really did hate that when you were growing up." He frowned, betrayed, at the mention of his childhood. "Sorry," she corrected herself. "But I need more."

"Sonic... uh, sure is a lame-o! 'Sonic'? More like 'Tonic', because he's, um, totally gross-tasting!"

Amy was still unconvinced.

He sighed and exhaled in defeat. "Amy," he spoke under his own vocal control, "I'm sorry for always taking Sonic away to test out the Tornado to give him an excuse for ditching you. It's wrong and I shouldn't do it. ...There, Tails, that wasn't so hard, was it?"

Her eyes went wide and she broke out in an explosion of joy, lifting him a foot from the ground and hugging him until he coughed from lack of air. "Oh, Cosmo, it really _is_ you!" she sang. "I was so worried! I'm so glad you're still here... er, however you are so!"

"Can... you... let... me go?" he murmured. "She may be in my body, but it's still a hundred percent fox and it still needs oxygen!"

"Ohp! I'm sorry, you two." She set him gently down and smiled expectantly. "Wanna go show everyone else this 'condition' of yours?" she asked sweetly.

"Oh, brother..."

* * *

"I've never seen anything like it!"

The attendees to this improvised gathering gazed in awe at the computer display Knuckles the echidna and sensible-minded medical technician had pulled up for them. "But the evidence is clear as day!" he continued. "Her mental functions are continuing as normal overlain with his in the same brain!"

Sure enough, the thermal scanner of the patient fox's cranial cavity showed a curious, frenetic mapping of activity. "Erm... Cosmo, how about you think about something scary, and Tails, you about something happy?"

"Okay! Okay..."

The computer monitor's output grew even stranger: areas of the amygdala and surrounding regions signifying both highly conflicting emotions lit up like wildfire. The fox grinned and sweated, and the sight was unpleasant enough that Knuckles was quick to announce, "Alright, we have confirmation! You two can stop now!"

"Hey, Cosmo, what'd you imagine?" Tails asked, relaxing his body in his chair and plucking the suction-cupped sensors off his forehead.

"Being covered with dreadful, sticky machine oil."

"Really? I was imagining the same thing!"

"So," Sonic thought aloud, contemplatively rubbing his muzzle with one finger, "what are you two gonna go by now that you're all Jekyll-and- _Fly_ de together?"

"'Co...ils'? How about 'Tai-o'? Erm, how about something with an agreeable sound that represents both of us? Ooh, I've got one! 'Screwdriver'! I use them in my woodworking projects, as do you in your machines! That one's alright, but what about 'Leaf'? Ooh, like my body and your blueprints! Fantastic idea! Ehh, I'm not sure now. You know what, Sonic?" he said, sighing. "You guys can just call us whichever one of us you're talking to."

"Uh... okay!" The hedgehog shrugged. "You're the one... er, ones, who have to live with that if people in public see us callin' you two different names. Though I guess I have heard of those weird spiritual kids from the Internet doing that..."

"W-we're going to try to separate again eventually!" Tails was sure to correct the unwelcome possible assumption. "But I think I _do_ like this new body, so I wouldn't mind staying in Hotel Tails a little longer. Right."

Cream the Rabbit bounced up and down with excitement. "It's okay, Mr. Tails and... Mr. Cosmo!" she reassured them. "You two can spend time together with not just each other, but whoever the other one of you would be with! You won't even be _able_ to be apart! It's gonna be so much fun!"

"Chao!" cheered her companion, Cheese the Chao.

"Yayyyy..." He pumped a deflated fist in the air at the news.

"Hey, Knuckie," purred Rouge the Bat, playfully clawing the echidna from behind his back and chuckling at his startled jump away from her. "I think _we_ should try something like that. Wanna pick up some extra-strength duct tape and have our own little holiday of togetherness?"

"No way, you creep! This isn't a joke; this is their lives for the time being! Trivializing that by... by sensualizing it is extremely condescending!"

"Alright, sorry I asked. But it would be great for the development of our acrobatic skills, you know, just like a three-legged race." She leaned in close to whisper another detail; he was cautiously receptive. "And I'd let you pick where we'd be conjoined."

"Urrrgh!" He swatted her away and she fell on the floor, howling with laughter. "That's it, it's time for my workout routines, and I'm turning the music up _loud_ this time to erase that image from my head!" He stormed off, Rouge winking at the others before sneaking in tiptoe behind him.

"Oh, Tails," he comforted himself. "Don't you worry; we'll get along much better than that! I'll be quiet whenever you need – I can even try to go to sleep while your part of our brain is awake, like a dolphin! Oh, no, I'm not worried about us," he sighed. "I'm just worried about them."

"Well, don't be! How different can our lives really be, anyway?"


	4. Chapter 4

The living room was warm and cozy and that was all fine and good, but most promising of all was its role as a source of conversation and activity. As the yawns escaping Tails' mouth and stretches into which his limbs contorted belied his restless energy on this evening, that was exactly what he needed.

And he was in luck: Amy, Cheese, and Cream were sprawled comfortably out on the carpeted floor holding a tea party dutifully and ornately arranged by the latter. The rabbit looked quite excited at hearing his footsteps, but his mouth had more impatient plans.

"Hey, you guys," Tails announced proudly, "you should try going to the bathroom as a boy sometime. Standing up is so convenient!" His face burned bright red and he clasped his hands over his mouth, but it was too late; they were all laughing hysterically. "Oh... I'm sorry, Tails!" he said in a muffled voice.

"Ahhh..." Amy wiped a tear from her eye, her lowering voice a much needed white flag in this moment. "So, I take it you two don't have much to do tonight?"

"Yeah!" he sighed thankfully. "Got any ideas?"

"I do!" Cream chirped up. "You can join our tea party!"

"Um..." He scratched the back of his head and rolled his eyes upward, searching frantically for a polite out to that suggestion. "Nah, I think I'd better not. Looks like you guys barely have enough tea as it is, and I wouldn't want to be a drain on your supply."

"That's so thoughtful of you, Mr. Tails!" said Cream. "Go ahead and have more, Cheese!" The Chao enthusiastically gulped the rest of his nice, warm beverage.

"I heard there's gonna be a scary movie on TV tonight!" Amy helped out, taking a quick glance at an old clock on a nearby table. "And it's gonna start in a few minutes! _I_ wanted to watch it with _Sonic_ , but he just so happened to develop a mysterious case of 'iris-itis' – his eyes are acting up to any bright lights... that aren't in Knuckles' exercise room."

"I hope he's okay," Cream added softly.

* * *

The gentle pitter-patter of the rain outdoors saturated the warm summer air with a comfortable humidity that provided a cozy, protective blanket around the complex and complemented tastefully the air-conditioned indoors of the den where the television was set up. Tails snuggled into the floor, his feet lazily propped into the air as he stared at the screen.

"Your body is so comfortable, Tails!" he sighed in ecstasy. "You're like a warm, fuzzy pillow! Uh... thank you" – he quickly lowered his voice to a whisper – "but would you mind quieting down a little so we can watch? Uh... sure..."

The film recommended them by Amy was a fairly standard, unremarkable pulp-zombie effort in all respects: a group of survivors were defending themselves in a decomposing city from a growing army of mindless mutants. Chromatically, there were lots of greys, browns, and greens everywhere, which did little to unsettle Tails himself besides their dim calling to mind of his girlfriend's long-gone ancestors. But the other hermit of his body had other ideas.

"Tails..." he whispered at the loudest pitch he could without risking any anger. "I'm scared. I don't want to watch this."

"Don't be scared! It's just a movie. None of this could ever happen. It's nothing to think too much about. ...Then why are you watching it with your eyes so wide?"

He sighed. "Come on, Cosmo, this is the best part! The zombies are finally gonna get the arrogant teenage guy who walked off by himself to prove how tough he was! It's gonna be great! Here, look!"

"No, it's not!" He shut his eyes tight, turned his head away from the bright and blaring screen, and shielded his ears from the audible, cartoonish carnage with both pointer fingers. "Hey, stop that! I want to watch!" They fought for a while over whether his sensory organs would be receiving input, but time was not on the side of seeing the complete movie, and when Tails finally wrenched his hands away and his eyes open, the exciting scene was over.

" _Come on, Cosmo!_ " he shouted. He stood up, almost on the verge of punching an anger-sized hole in the screen but settling instead for turning the device off.

"Tails, I'm... I'm so..." He began to cry, but soon enough began to wipe each tear away, gently and understandingly. "It's okay," he whispered. "I shouldn't have tried to force you to watch something that scared you. Want to watch something else?"

He sniffled again. "You mean it?"

"Of course I do!" He smiled and knelt beside the television's dials to test out the other channels – surely _something_ good had to be on.

* * *

"All the good stuff on and _this_ is what you want to watch?" Tails moaned.

"This isn't 'good'?" he pouted. "The archaeology of the carpentry techniques of eastern countries isn't 'interesting' to you?"

"Well..." He clutched his temples in frustration, defying every inclination to switch the set off and do something else or even simply to look away. "Maybe it would be moreso if these people would just try good old-fashioned, efficient nails and screws instead of this dumb interlocking 'timber-framing'- Ack! Now I'm _learning_ stuff!"

"I'm sorry, Tails," he said and finally did turn the set off without protestation. "I can't believe there's nothing we can do that we'll both enjoy."

"Erm... hey, maybe there is!" He brightened up and looked around the dark room for stimulation, but his eyes were directed instead just outside.

"Would you like to go on a walk, Tails?"

"I would love to!"

* * *

The torrential rain slammed down onto the city, aggravating the silent wounds of the long-uncared asphalt streets and bathing the lawns of the few houses with wealthy enough land plots to accommodate them in just a little too much water. The sky being obscured for the foreseeable near future with its murky parade of cumulonimbus clouds, bright white streetlights, traffic lights, and lit interiors of apartments formed the only major sources of illumination.

And yet, it was a sublimely beautiful improvised work of jungle art. Or it was perceived as such by some of its active audience, anyway.

"Do you think you'll be okay out here?" he asked non-confrontationally, dragging his feet over the flooding sidewalk.

"I... uh, I don't like being waterlogged much, but I think I can handle it. Really, haha? I feel like I'm swimming in a muddy lagoon. It's not clear or pristine in the traditional sense, but it feels wonderful."

He smiled, the work of both of his occupants. "Then maybe I can learn to like it. ...I love you, Cosmo."

"I love you, too." He held one of his hands in the other.

"Actually... okay." He laughed and prepared to posit one minor suggestion. "Doesn't it at least feel weird to have all this water sloshing around in my... in our shoes?"

"I suppose it does. Why don't we fix that?"

He giggled and took them off, along with his socks, and held them under his arm. The nighttime walk through the city progressed thereafter with rainwater seeping around the rough pads and sharp claws of his feet and matting all nearby fur. A rude splash from a rude driver gave him the idea to willingly walk around in the congealing, dirty slush of the curbs. Over not much time, a thin but defined layer of mud began to cake on his feet.

And when he came back, grinning like a madman who had lost his hat and was far too happily energetic for tea, Amy was waiting worriedly for him in a bathrobe and slippers. "Tails, your feet are filthy!" she cried. "You go and take a bath right now! And please, try your best not to track that mud everywhere. Did you visit a farm during your walk? I didn't know we had any around here..."

"Why, no," he giggled, raising his tails into a light and comfortable hover to keep his feet off the floor. "But who really goes out in a monsoon to stay proper and clean, anyway?"


	5. Chapter 5

Tails began his journey from the bath to the bed as an exceedingly wet fox, and with all the vigorous rubbing he did during his slow walk with a towel that just might have been the only object in the building softer than him, he finished it a very dry fox.

"Tails," he murmured dreamily the second his head hit the cushion, "if I ever get my own body back, I want to grow fur just like yours."

"I... don't know if that would be medically feasible," he considered, opening his eyes a smidge to consider the scientific dilemma out loud and rub his chin with one hand for good measure. "But that's nothing to worry about – you'll always have something warm and fuzzy you can rub as long as you like!"

"Why, that's right!" he gasped. "Mr. Muddy, I- I don't know what I would do without you!"

With that, he withdrew from behind another pillow a plush pig, which he cuddled lovingly.

"Uh... yeah, him too! I forgot I'd left that dumb old toy in here, ahehe! Well, I don't care; I'm way too old for those things anyway." Tossing Mr. Muddy off the bed, he rolled onto his other side to keep his eyes firmly away from the temptation.

"Heehee, whatever you say, Tails." He blushed. "So... does that mean you're ready to... erm, 'hit the sack'?"

"I sure am!" he breathed. "Sweet dreams, Cosmo! May they contain, uh, lots of soft soil and water! Yours too, Tails! May they contain lots of soft soil for burrowing and water for drinking! ...Those are fox activities, right? ...Erm, that didn't come out right."

"I liked it. Nighty-night!"

Shutting his eyes for real, he yawned loudly and scratched at a tenaciously itchy spot on his chest. Satisfied, he rolled over a couple of times and breathed comfortably out again. He was descending into dreamland, each spirit feeling as much at home as it possibly could within his body. He was at complete peace.

* * *

"Yaaaaaaahhhhh!"

"...H-huh? What? What's going on?"

Rubbing away the strangely elusive drops of sleep from his eyes, he looked idly down at his chest: he could tell audibly that his heart was pounding like mad, and the sheets were monsooned in sweat. "Cosmo, what's going on?"

"...Oh. I-it was a dream. ...Tails, did I wake you up?"

"No, but it sounds like some terrifying monster did or something..."

"I'm so sorry!" he fretted. Giving himself a punch in the face as punishment, he reeled back at the realization of what he'd done. "Ohhh, you felt that too! I'm sorry again! Th-that was just supposed to be for-"

His hand went over his mouth, as did a mental command to stop talking for a second until he could calm down. "That's better. No, Cosmo, I'm not mad, but what happened?"

"W-well..."

* * *

"Wow, haha, I guess that does sound pretty scary! But it's okay," he assured, patting his stomach for comfort, "none of those terrible things are real, from the giant lawnmower and the fidgety lumberjack to the mutant rabbits and the incontinent old dogs!"

"...You're right, I'm just being silly. Will you be able to get back to sleep alright, Tails?"

"I'm sure I will," he yawned, laying his head gently back down on the pillow. "Nighty-night, Cosmo," he said with a tired smile, "and here's hoping your sleep is only interrupted by one dumb old nightmare tonight!"

* * *

"I guess six bad dreams isn't THAT many," Tails grumbled, lolling on his way to the kitchen. "That's evidence of a healthy, alert brain great at responding to threats!"

"Heehee, I'm glad you're okay with my... sometimes unusual sleep patterns." He patted himself on the back.

"Uh... yeah..."

"That's good – now, how would you feel about getting breakfast?"

"Well... we've come to the right place, haven't we?" He closed his eyes, wishing wistfully that he could have just a few more minutes – or days, if life were that generous – of sleep, and was only awoken from his instant-made reverie by his foot jutting out to stop his fall.

"Please be careful, Tails! I wouldn't want you to hurt yourself. Now... do you have any ideas of what to eat?" A loud noise from his stomach affirmed the need.

"Hey!" He brightened up at an idea. "What if we said our ideas at the same time? ...Er, I mean, one right after the other? Maybe we'll even have the same idea, and that'll be super-convenient, or if not, we can just pick one or the other!"

"Sure! Okay, are you ready, Tails!"

Rumble, rumble. "As ever! On the count of three, okay? One..."

"Two..."

"Three! Hashbrowns-toastwithjelly!"

He stared blankly into space.

"I- I mean," he mumbled, "sweet stuff isn't my favorite, but..."

"Neither are greasy things mine... oh, who cares. We can do that!"

But he would have to wait no longer for his solution, which arrived in the form of a familiar pink hedgehog.

"Hello, you two!" said Amy. "I couldn't help but overhear your little quandary here, and I think it'd be good to mention that _I_ have been working lately on my cooking skills."

"Oh, hi, Amy!" said Tails, glad at the opportunity to postpone the anxiety. "Hello! So, it seems that you have an idea that you think we'll like – or at least Tails will, hopefully?"

"No, you lovebirds are going to have a dish that will satisfy you both. Those hours slaving away in here working to entice _my_ lovebird with the perfect chili dog will _not_ go to waste, nor will my natural creativity! Besides, of course I know you and I know what you like."

The gurgling of Tails' stomach came anew with excitement. "If you put it like that, I think that sounds delicious! Thank you so much!"

"Great!" Amy cheered. "Now I hope you won't mind vacating the kitchen for half an hour or so – the chef needs privacy to work her magic."

* * *

With Amy's dish placed before him, Tails stared down at it.

"I guess... that's exactly what she said we were going to get!" he laughed. "Equally satisfying to both of us, and really creative! Uh... what do you think, Cosmo?"

"Um..." He grimaced at a small, murky pool adorning the plate. "I don't like the look of that potato grease being so close to the crust..."

"Oh, I'm sure it won't get on it. B-but... everything's on _everything_! "

"Heehee, are you telling me that after all those astounding adventures we had out in outer space... you're afraid to try a bite of hashbrowns on toast with jelly?"

He sniffed it, reeling from the strange odor.

"Maybe a little."

Still, he managed to twist his fingers into a working fist around his fork and scoop up a small corner of toast, dripping with salty and sweet goodness all over. "It'll make Amy happy if we at least just eat a little of it, Cosmo," he explained. "Pleeeeease?"

"Okayyyyy, but I have a bad feeling about it..."

In agreement, he swallowed the bite of food. It seemed inoffensive, so he took a few more bites, dabbing his mouth with a handy paper towel and sighing rather satisfiedly.

"What do you think?" he chirped eagerly.

His pose to deliver the response would be a standing one, and his mask of victory would be a scowl of revulsion. "I think I hope the toilet's working..."

Scooting off to the nearest bathroom and allowing his stomach to become empty once more, all he could hear over the wretched noise was Amy's voice, optimistic as ever: "Do you have a stomach flu? Too bad you never even got to try my extravaganza, but I'll whip you up something in a second to make it better!"

When he could finally catch his breath and bear the taste of bile, he managed to squeeze a few words out, though too quiet of words for the hedgehog to hear. "Tails, I'm not sure being together like this is as perfect as we'd hoped."

"What, a little sickness is enough to scare you off?" he chided. "Wow, you're pretty easily discouraged, haha."

"Tails? Cosmo?" Amy called, again audible. "I had to improvise 'cause we don't have a lot of ingredients, but what flavor of tea would you prefer: maple syrup, tomato, or saltine?"

"...You're right. I wanna go back to us being just us."


End file.
